It was quiet on Cazenovia Lake Sunday. The half-mile wide, four-mile long lake, about 20 miles southeast of Syracuse, offers fisherman a sweet spot for chain pickerel, bluegills, largemouth and smallmouth bass. Kayakers and canoers can pop in from Helen McNitt State Park. Swimmers can wade from the life-guarded sandy beach or jump into the 45- foot deep lake from their boats. And horse trainers can watch winners at Saratoga.
Ronnie Breed Jr. fired up his phone and watched the fifth at Saratoga with his wife, twin daughters, his sister and her husband in the middle of Cazenovia Lake, 86 miles from his base at Finger Lakes Racetrack.
“We were screaming,” Breed said. “We were screaming.”
It was a rare afternoon off for the 36-year-old trainer who rides High Command and his other 11 horses every morning. High Command, the longest shot on the board of seven, returning from a sixmonth layoff, cocked his head to the right like he was looking for his trainer while somehow lasting 9 furlongs in a slow-motion, grind-it-out finish. Breed’s former boss, Tom Morley, met the bay gelding and jockey Benjamin Hernandez at the winner’s circle.
“How many New York-breds want to run a mile-and-an-eighth? Not many,” Breed said of the decision to ship High Command for the New York-bred allowance. “He was down there all winter, this pandemic went on, I brought him back home, I turned him out for a month and slowly brought him back. I entered him at Finger Lakes a couple of times, the race didn’t go, didn’t go, didn’t go. I worked him a couple of more times, the Saratoga book came out and I pointed him for the race. We went for it and we got it.”
Owned and bred by Carl Buhr, the 4-year-old son of Soaring Empire got his sixth career win. For Breed, it was his 38th career win, his first this year and first at Saratoga. With $120,950, High Command increased his lead as Breed’s leading earner. Tancredi, High Command’s lead pony in the morning, lags in second with $49,469.
“When I ran him a one-turn mile, he burned himself up, he’d like to run off. I just figured he loves to go two turns, it helps him relax. If someone wants to go with us, let them go, because I know he’ll run all day long,” Breed said. “He’s a quirky horse. He tries to look at the other horses, but if I open up the blinkers, he doesn’t want to run, that’s just how he is. Head’s up. He’s got cotton in his ears, any kind of noise, that’s it. He’s got his weird, weird ways.”
Son of longtime Finger Lakes stalwarts, owner/ breeder Ronald Sr. and trainer Debra, Breed learned the game from his parents, mucking stalls, walking hots, galloping horses. Nothing has changed.
“I get on every single one of my horses every day,” Breed said. “Do stalls, groom them up, get on them. My wife and I do it all. It’s just a family affair.”
Breed saddled his first runner and winner Oct. 15, 2012 when Valuable Lady scored as the favorite in a Finger Lakes allowance. He won three races that year, six in 2013, six in 2014 and eight in 2015. That’s when he needed a job.
“I started my career here,” Breed said. “I gave up training because we were struggling.”
Breed asked Morley if he needed an assistant, and stayed for two-and-a-half years. It was a heady time with Ballerina winner and Breeders’ Cup starter Haveyougoneaway, and others. There was one day that stood out, Oct. 22, 2016, the day Brother O’Connell won the Mohawk for Morley, Bar Of Gold won the Empire Distaff for John Kimmel and Breakin The Fever won the Hudson for the Breeds. They were in the same barn at Belmont Park.
“All three horses from that barn. We have the picture of all three horses outside that barn,” Breed said. “My dad’s homebred beat Weekend Hideaway that day.”
Breed went back out on his own in September 2017. Based at Belmont Park that fall, he went 1-for-20 (the winner was at Laurel Park) and decided to head home with his wife, Jessica, and daughters, Layla and Anastasia. Partly business, mostly personal.
“It was hard because we loved being at Belmont. It was a tough decision, but we thought it was the right decision,” Breed said. “Quality of life. Be closer to family. We wanted to give our kids a better life, the school district is smaller, financially we thought it would be better for us.”
Sometimes perspective is learned in the barn and sometimes it’s learned earlier than that. Breed was diagnosed with leukemia when he was 3. Yeah, that will instill perspective.
“I beat cancer. To do what I do today is big. I count my blessings all the time. You look at all the people in the world who die of cancer, you say, ‘You know what, I made it through. I fought.’ And I keep fighting to make everything better, try to be better,” Breed said. “That’s the way I look at it, keep working, keep fighting and maybe things will turn out. Everybody’s got their sorrows, they’re down in the dumps doing this and that, I keep pushing on, they kept me around for a reason and we just keep going. People have all this sorrow, ‘don’t have money for this, big truck, big this, big that.’ But I’ve got my life. I’ve got my life.”
And a winner at Saratoga.
